I had a tough choice last night. I could go to Miller Park, sit in the bucolic press box with its stellar view and watch, in person, as CC Sabathia made his first start in a Brewers uniform.

That night would be filled with professional insight, networking, note taking and watching the Brewers without cheering or showing any emotion.

Or, I could watch the game in my pal Corey's basement, alongside my other buddy, Eron. These guys are two of my closest friends, all three of us having stood up in each others' weddings, forming a bond that has been firmly cemented over years of watching bad Brewers baseball.

That night would involve grilling out, drinking beer, watching the game on a puny 21-inch TV and throwing the baseball around before the pre-game show.

Guess which option I picked?

A little background: astute readers already know that I'm a rabid fan, but Eron and Corey join me in my insane Brewers devotion. So we treated this matchup like it was the seventh game of the World Series. (Coincidentally, Corey had an even smaller TV sitting in his basement bar, too, playing a VHS tape of game seven of the '82 World Series -- the symbolism was not lost on us.)

All three of us dug out some old clothes that we felt were appropriate for this potential turning point in the franchise. I found my Robin Yount T-shirt that my grandma gave me in 1990. Threadbare and dated with its awful neon-pink lettering, I only wear this shirt for very special occasions now. Eron searched his basement and found a thrift store homemade '82 Brewers shirt, with the ball and glove logo busting through the St. Louis Arch (it was so tight, he insisted on wearing another shirt over it). Corey brought out his Cooperstown Robin Yount shirt from our '99 pilgrimage to the Hall of Fame.

Before the game, the three of us overgrown kids stood across the street, throwing the baseball way too hard without warming up. We were joined by Corey's 3-year-old son Owen, who was, of course, wearing a Corey Hart shirt.

That poignant moment, by the way, did not elude me. Eron has two kids, Corey has one with another on the way and we're expecting our first in September. We're all in very different spots than we were when we spent that morning throwing it around in Cooperstown, but the giddiness of baseball has a magical way of bringing us right back there.

Our turkey and veggie brats finished grilling just in time for the first pitch. We stood and cheered and clapped as CC Sabathia threw his first pitch over the plate for a strike. We watched the game with playoff-like intensity, making a ridiculously big deal of every routine play. And when Ryan Braun jacked a three-run home run in the bottom of the first, we instinctively screamed, in unison, "Get up! Get up! Get out of here! Gone!"

The tape of game seven coincidentally ended within two minutes of Brian Shouse retiring Brad Hawpe to secure the win. As we had so many times before, we watched Gorman Thomas strike out to lose the World Series, and Corey remarked that maybe the Brewers were finally passing the torch.

Again, it's easy to get one's hopes up in the middle of July, especially when your beloved team trades for the reigning AL Cy Young Award Winner.

But I'd feel almost as happy this morning if the Brewers had lost that game. Baseball made us kids again, if only for one comical evening.

The three of us don't get together for a game very often anymore. But we promised to do this again. Soon.

Going nuts on a Tuesday night over a regular-season game is, well, childlike.  And that's the way it should be.